How Much Weight Can I Lose if I Burn 600 Calories a Day?

by
KIM NUNLEY Last Updated: Jan 16, 2014

Kim Nunley

Kim Nunley has been screenwriting and working as an online health and fitness writer since 2005. She’s had multiple short screenplays produced and her feature scripts have placed at the Austin Film Festival. Prior to writing full-time, she worked as a strength coach, athletic coach and college instructor. She holds a master's degree in kinesiology from California State University, Fullerton.

How Much Weight Can I Lose if I Burn 600 Calories a Day?Photo Credit Jupiterimages/Stockbyte/Getty Images

As long as you simultaneously make healthy eating and drinking decisions, your 600-calorie daily workouts will cause you to lose weight. By burning an additional 600 calories every day with exercise, you have the potential to lose about 5 pounds per month. How much you’ll lose, however, depends on how strict you are with your nutritional habits.

Calories for Weight Loss

A pound of fat is equal to 3,500 calories. You create a caloric deficit by burning more calories than you consume, which you can do by exercising more frequently, limiting your food intake and making healthy food and drink decisions. When you create a caloric deficit, your body breaks down the fat you have stored in your body, which it then converts into glycogen to use as fuel. Create this deficit gradually over time so your body can adapt to the changes.

Rate of Loss

A healthy rate of weight loss is 1 to 2 pounds per week, or 4 to 8 pounds per month.Photo Credit tetmc/iStock/Getty Images

If you’re burning about 600 calories per day with your workouts and are exercising every day, you will be creating a 3,500 caloric deficit and thus lose a pound about every six days. That means in a month, you’ll lose about 5 pounds. According to the American Council on Exercise, a healthy rate of weight loss is 1 to 2 pounds per week, or 4 to 8 pounds per month.

Not Forgetting Nutrition

The only way your 600-calorie workouts will allow you to lose about 5 pounds per month is if you simultaneously follow a healthy nutritional plan. If you consume too many calories, you won’t be creating the caloric deficit needed for fat loss. A high-calorie, high-fat meal can quickly cancel out the 600 calories you burned during your workout. Use an online BMR calculator to find your basal metabolic rate -- the number of calories your body burns at rest -- to estimate how many calories you should consume every day. Monitor what you’re eating and drinking so you set yourself up for weight-loss success.

Burning 600 Calories

Burning 600 calories every day is a challenging feat. According to Health Status, a person weighing about 175 pounds will burn 600 or more calories after a 60-minute workout consisting of Zumba, running at a pace of 5 mph, a rowing workout at a vigorous intensity, riding the elliptical, swimming or a vigorous-intensity spinning session. However, that same 175-pound person would come short of burning 600 calories in a 60-minute session of walking at a pace of 4 mph, moderate-intensity swimming, aerobics and moderate-intensity rowing and spinning sessions.

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